Berkeley, CA – Microsoft Corporation has launched a Web-based home energy management service, Hohm, which uses the energy models in the Home Energy SaverTM, developed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). Craig Mundie, Microsoft’s Chief Strategist made the announcement at the Edison Electric Institute’s annual convention in San Francisco. Hohm will provide homeowners with a web-based energy dashboard to help them manage their home’s energy use more effectively.

“Microsoft’s licensing of the Home Energy SaverTM ,will bring important capabilities of our home energy-efficiency software technology to an even broader user base than it currently has,” said Evan Mills, a scientist with the Environmental Energy Technologies Division of Berkeley Lab who serves as team leader for the Home Energy SaverTM project.

“This is an example of the power of publicly financed energy research being harnessed by the private sector to develop entirely new applications and markets,” added Rich Brown, leader of the project’s energy analysis program.

Home Energy SaverTM is designed to help consumers identify the best ways to save energy in their homes, and find the resources to make the savings happen. It provided the first Internet-based tool for calculating energy use in residential buildings. About one million people visit the Home Energy SaverTM Website each year, more than 90-percent of whom are homeowners and renters. The Home Energy SaverTM calculator quickly computes a home’s energy use on-line based on methods developed at Berkeley Lab. Users can estimate how much energy and money can be saved and how much emissions can be reduced by implementing energy-efficiency improvements.

Berkeley Lab is a U.S. Department of Energy national laboratory located in Berkeley, California. It conducts unclassified scientific research and is managed by the University of California. Visit our website at http://www.lbl.gov.